


Happy Birthday (I Love You)

by averysubtleart



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Marriage Proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-10
Updated: 2012-11-10
Packaged: 2017-11-18 09:04:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/559229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/averysubtleart/pseuds/averysubtleart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur hates his birthday.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happy Birthday (I Love You)

There is this thing about Arthur that's both a blessing and a curse. Predominantly, it's the latter.

Arthur's born on the first of April, otherwise more widely known as April Fool's Day. The only thing he doesn't mind about it is that it's the day his mum brought him into this world.

Actually, scratch that. There isn't anything he likes about his birthday, to be honest. The joy he gets from building impossible architecture in dreamspace and Eames is only enough to make up for the shit he has to tolerate from incompetent workers, last minute discoveries, being ratted out on, Cobb's crazy ideas, you get the point.

His life  _just fucking sucks_  sometimes.

Since he was a kid, he gets all the horrible presents on his birthday. He's not going to go into details, because just...  _no_. How is he even supposed to enjoy life when the only day he's supposed to be happy turns out to be the day everyone gets to shit on him, and it doesn't even matter at all, because  _oh hey_ , April Fool's!

(And there was this time he got kidnapped on guess what, the  _first of April_ , but it turned out to be a prank that gone too far. Someone went home with a few broken ribs. Go figure.)

That aside, it's his birthday again. Eames tells him he's got a surprise for him, but he's crossing his fingers and praying to the gods that that's not true. Fuck knows what Eames can come up with.

He wakes up and everything's thankfully normal, the tap doesn't explode in his face when he's brushing his teeth, he doesn't have a boner drawn across his face in black Sharpie, the coffee machine doesn't break down and anyway Eames has made him a cup of coffee, brewed (lovingly) in his favourite way.

"Morning, darling," Eames greets him in the kitchen, handing him a mug of coffee.

"Morning." He takes a sip of the drink, and _oh_ , if it's actually possible he's going to make Eames his personal barista. "It's good," he remarks, feeling pretty generous.

"Glad you like it," Eames replies and winks at him before walking out.

That's when the shit gets centre stage.

Arthur pads into his study and sets his mug of coffee down on the table. He's about to power his laptop when he notices there's something wrong with the deck of namecards he keeps (but has no use for them at all), beside the Newton's cradle at the corner of the desk.

Ordinarily, the deck of cards should look like this:  
  
 _Arthur Delaney, Business Consultant_  

Today, it looks like this:

_Arthur Darling, Professional Stalker_

The next thing that Arthur notices is a yellow post-it stuck at the bottom of his card holder and a single stemmed red rose lying beside it 

_Happy ~~April Fool's~~  Birthday, darling_   
_xoxo_

Arthur snatches the first card on the deck (sweet of Eames to make it precisely as sharp as his original ones are) and bellows, a crescendo of warnings, as he storms out of room.

Immediately, he can hear laughter roaring throughout the house and footsteps thumping up the staircase.

:::

Arthur is ready to snarl "Fuck you, Eames" when he enters their bedroom, only to find said male down on own knee, his face wiped clean of everything.

"What the fuck."

"Like I said, darling, it's meant to be a surprise."

Arthur can feel the edges of the namecard cutting into his skin, from the way he's gripping it. As much as he wants to slit Eames' throat with the card, he stops himself. He pinches the bridge of his nose with his other free hand, closes his eyes, breathes and counts to ten.

When he opens his eyes again, he feels much more composed than before, his hand has loosened its grip on the card. There is a faint crease on Eames' brow, a look that Arthur's grown to recognise as a sign of worry or panic that he's trying to hide. Serves him right, Arthur thinks.

"All better now, love?" Arthur can't believe Eames has the gall to ask him that when less than a minute ago, he almost made his blood reach boiling point.

"No, and I can still kill you with this." He means for it to come out as a threat, but it probably sounds like he doesn't mean it at all. Dammit.

"If that's so, I think I'd like to say this before I get decapitated by your lovely hands. Marry me, Arthur."

Okay, that's totally not expected. Arthur drops the card he's holding in his hand, the same hand drifting into his pocket and holds the reassuring weight of his die in his palm. Fuck the stupid namecard. This is reality; he's not dreaming.

" _What_."

"I hardly think this is necessary, but I'll repeat myself again. Marry me, Arthur."

This time, Eames pulls out two simple titanium bands from his pocket, one obviously smaller than the other. The crease on his forehead is gone; it's now replaced by a genuine smile on his face, sincere and hopeful.

Arthur suddenly wants to kiss Eames senseless really badly.

"Yes," he says, and in that same moment some dickhead neighbour decides to drill a hole into his wall.

"WHAT?" Eames yells, cupping a ear with his free hand. He's grinning like the Cheshire cat now and Arthur knows he's caught his answer from lip reading. He's only faking it this time, that twat.

"JESUS FUCK, YES, NOW GET UP SO I CAN KISS YOU," Arthur yells into Eames's face, a smile splitting across his face. Eames finally stands, slips both rings quickly on to Arthur's ring finger, covers the distance between them in a single stride and Arthur kisses him, hard and fierce. Eames is laughing into the kiss, his eyes crinkling and Arthur loves him so  _so_  much he can never love another and everything is just wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.

Maybe Arthur doesn't hate his birthday that much anymore.

FIN


End file.
